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Oops! Little boy shuts down Madrid metro with wayward balloon

Jessica Jones
Jessica Jones - [email protected]
Oops! Little boy shuts down Madrid metro with wayward balloon
Photo: Sergio Patiño/Flickr

A little boy inadvertently caused chaos, shutting down Madrid’s busiest metro line, when he lost his grip on the string of a helium ballon on Wednesday morning.

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A case of butter fingers was to blame for closure on one of Madrid's busiest metro lines on Wednesday morning, causing more than an hour of delays for commuters during rush hour in the Spanish capital.

A little boy waiting on the platform of Sol, Madrid’s most central and busiest metro station, lost grip of his helium balloon, which floated upwards and collided with an overhead cable just as a train was entering the station.

The aluminum foil coating on the balloon burnt the cables and severed the connection between the overhead cables and the train, causing a power cut on both sides of the tracks. 

Line two of the Madrid Metro was out of order for around an hour during the busiest time of the day, from 7.15am to 8.15am.

The line was suspended along five of Madrid’s busiest and most central stations, from Banco de España to Santo Domingo.

And it could not have been worse timing. Today Madrid is rolling out ‘Scenario One’ to tackle air pollution, which includes lowering the speed limit on the city’s roads to 70km/hour (44mph) and encouraging people to leave their cars at home and take public transport. 

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